NEW FOBMS AND TECHNIQUE VERSE

(i) REASONS FOB DEALING WITH VERSE SEPARATELY FROMPROSE

 THE literary revolt to which we have referred in the preceding chapter was accompanied by a desire to lay the foundation of a new literature in Urdu by employing it in wholly untried channels informed by the spirit and modelsof English literature. The task was by no means an easyone, for the literary taste of the people had grown as hardenedas the social evils, and it was as difficult to purify the oneas it was to eradicate the other. Still, thanks to the efforts of the pioneers of this movement and those who are carrying on their work at the present day, there has come into existence a voluminous literature of a new type, infinitely morebulky than all the old Urdu literature produced during the preceding two centuries. In the present chapter an endeavour will be made to examine the outward form of this new literature anddetermine its indebtedness to English. For reasons explained in the Introduction, a chronological treatment of the subject will not be attempted. We shall therefore straightway proceed to notice what forms, undeniablyEnglish in structure, have either been newly incorporated into Urdu literature or have influenced those already in existence. For the sake of clearness these forms may be classified into two convenient groups, either according to subject, under Poetry and Non-Poetry, or according to form, underVerse and Prose. As our immediate interest in this chapter is more in the form than in the substance or subject of Urduliterature, although a consideration of their inter-relation and even inter-dependence can hardly be avoided, it seemsmore appropriate to follow the latter division. In fact, inasmuch as Urdu poetry, with the possible exception of the new ouptut of dramatic writing, which is mainly in prose, and which orthodox literary opinion is so far reluctant to recognise as serious literature, is almost entirely in verse, the division according to form will practically resolve itself into a division according to substance. It will, moreover,present the subject of our discussion in proper historical perspective. For, as we have pointed out elsewhere, there was no prose in Urdu prior to the advent of English influence and all literature was exclusively in verse. The proposeddivision, therefore, will, by keeping the two separate, help us to trace the development of Urdu versification on the onehand, and to notice the rise and growth of Urdu prose onthe other. 

(ii) THE LIMITATIONS OF EARLY VERSIFICATION

We shall take the department of verse first, which, as stated above, covers practically the whole of existing Urdupoetry. Before we enter upon an examination of this field, it will be helpful to suggest that as the practice of writing poetry in Urdu was long in existence and certain notions about poetic art had already found general acceptance in the country, the writers of the New School have found it rather hard to incorporate into Urdu poetry any new formsfrom English literature as freely as they have done in prose, where everything was new and where there was no fear of anyclash with the ideals of any earlier literature. In fact the prosodic system borrowed from Persian, and through Persian from Arabic, indulged in such a large variety of metrical and stanzaic forms that any effort to load the list any further without any reference to the organic growth and genius of  the language, and simply for the sake of imitation of the forms of a different literature, however great in itself, wouldhave been a sheer waste of energy. It would have given even to the most sincere feeling, when expressed in unfamiliar forms, the touch of artificiality, a sin from which the leaders of the New Movement have been anxious to save their literature. What we shall, therefore, find is not so much the incorporations of new forms from English prosody as the assimilation of the spirit underlying their formation. It will be remembered that the great obstacle to freedomof expression lay in the technique of the different forms of Urdu poetry. For instance, in the Ghazal and the Qa$ida, the most popular forms, it was a cardinal principle of Urduprosody that every distich comprising it should end in the same rhyme. If the Qaslda happened to be, say, of ninety distichs, it followed that the composer should employ nearly the same number of words which would rhyme together. Some of the words might be repeated, but repetition tookaway from the merit of the composition. This insistence on the use of parallel rhyming words was the chief source of artificiality in early poetry. Too often it required the composer to select his words first, and then to think out ideas to suit these words. It was obviously a most unnatural order, and contributed greatly to the absence of continuity of thought and unity in the Ghazal and similar compositions. Owing to the existence in Arabic and Persian of a large number of words rhyming together which Urdu has always freely borrowed, some of the Urdu poets, such as Ghalib, occasionally succeeded in finding a group of words to suit their ideas, and thus introducing into a few of their Ghazals and Qasidas a certain amount of unity. But that wasmore an exception than a rule. Another source of artificiality in Urdu poetry was its conventional poetic diction, borrowed again from Persian and Arabic, the nature of which we have already, in apreceding chapter, tried to explain.

 (iii) THE RISE OF THE NEW SCHOOL OF POETRY 

Sayyid Altaf Husayn Hall, the founder of the New Schoolof Poetry in Urdu, was particularly struck by these outstanding defects in the poetry of his mother tongue. Bornin 1837 l at Pampat, a few miles from Delhi, the homeof Urdu poetry, he came at an early age under the influence of Mirza Asadu'llah Khan Ghalib of Delhi, probably the most original of the early Urdu poets. The age of Ghalibwas still the age of convention, and neither the master northe pupil could lightly dispense with the conventional style, although one might notice a certain amount of conscious attempt in the poems of Ghalib's maturer years and the early writings of Hall to subordinate it to their thought andfeeling. As the latter avowed, 2 he keenly felt the shackles of the stereotyped diction in his youth ; but he had not the necessary boldness then, nor the force of example, nor anyencouragement to break them and give the heart a loose rein. This opportunity came to him in the middle of his life, when, owing to the vicissitudes which overtook respectable Muslim families of Delhi after the great Indian Mutinyin 1857, Hall, like his contemporary and townsman,Muhammad Husayn Azad, migrated from his home in search of employment and accepted service at Lahore in the educational department of the Government of the Punjab.Fortunately at the time this department was presided overby Col. W. R. N. Holroyd, whose name deserves to be remembered in connection with the development of Urdupoetry, as that of Dr. J. B. Gilchrist with the growth of Urdu prose. Under the sympathetic direction of this English officer, Hall and Azad were for some time engaged1 See obituary notice, Institute Gazette Aligarh, Jan. 6, 1915. 2 See the Preface to Muaaddas-i-fftili. in reviewing Urdu translations of standard English authors and also compiling suitable text-books in Urdu for use in Indian schools, fashioned no doubt on English models. 1 The personal contact with Col. Holroyd, together with whatdirect acquaintance they were able to form of some of the masterpieces of English literature in pursuance of their official duties, speedily stimulated their genius and awakenedthem to realise painfully by contrast that all was not well with their poetry, under whose spell they had so far wastedtheir powers, and that unless a new life was infused into it and its direction turned into fresh channels, there was acertain danger of its deteriorating still further, and seriously affecting the life of the rising generation. The desire to improve their national poetry, which this awakening gave rise to, soon began to materialise. In 1874, at the instance of Azad and Col. Holroyd, the PunjabAnjuman undertook to organise monthly " Musha'iras " or meetings of poets where poems representing some of the features of English poetry were to be presented. 2 Of this organisation, the moving spirit was undoubtedly Azad, although, realising his limitations as a poet, he did not contribute more than a few poems, of which the odes on the " Sunset/' " Queen Victoria's Jubilee," and the Khwdbi-Amnt or " Slumber of Security," are still read with pleasure. Hall's health did not permit him to stay in Lahore very long, and he could not attend more than four of these meetings, for every one of which, however, he wrote a poem. JBdrkha-rut (Rainy Season) has the honour of being the first of this group, followed by Nishdt-i-Umayd (the Joy of Hope), Hubb-i-Watan (Love of Country), and Munazara-i-Rahm waIn$df (Dialogue between Mercy and Justice). We shall discuss the form of these poems later on along 1 See Preface to Majmu'a-i-Nazm-i-If&li, 1890, Delhi. 2 Ibid. Also Tahzlb u 'l>AJMdq, Fazlu'd-Din's Collection, Vol. II., No. 635, Lahore, 1897.  VEESE with the others of ffdll. But it should be mentioned here that these four poems heralded the dawn of a new era in Urdu poetry. The year 1874 will thus be remembered as anepoch-making year in the history of Urdu literature, whenthe foundations of the New School of poetry were laid. Recalling this "Musha'ira" seventeen years after, and his first attempt under its auspices, Hall observes : " Had this movement taken its rise fifteen years earlier, it would probably not have borne any fruit. For such of those (literary men) in Hindustan as had any command overversification in Urdu (at the time) regarded poetry as synonymous with love-making, and exaggeration as anessential ingredient of poetic utterance, and imagined that the poetic rendering of facts and realities of life was contraryto the aims of true poetry. These men had never seen in their language any specimens of the literary art of the Weston which they could have based their poetic effort. Fortunately, however, this movement took its rise at a time whenthe spirit of Western ideas was being infused into the Urdulanguage. A good many books and essays on literary subjects had already been translated from English, and manymore were in the process of translation. In the native newspapers, of which the Journal of the Scientific Society of Aligarh desires special mention, translations of manyarticles from the English Press were being published. Asa result, the style of Western writing was gradually gamingground in the hearts of the people. So much so, that in 1872 Sir Sayyid A^mad Khan issued the Journal Tahgib u- ^-AIMdq (Refining of Manners), through whose instrumentality there quickly came about a profound change in the ideas of those Muslims who had a right disposition for literature. Consequently the old style of Urdu and Persian writings began to appear in their eyes light and undignified. They began to look down with contempt on their system of poetry. There was then no good imitation of Westernpoetry in Urdu, nor has there been any till now. Butsometimes even a little stir is enough : what little melody of Western literature had so far reached the seekers after newpaths was enough to move them to enthusiasm. As a result, many a person whose mind was already deeply coloured byEastern poetry began to take part in this ' Musha'ira ' (of 1874)." i 1 See Preface to Majm&a-i-Natm-i-B&ll, 1890, Delhi.  It will thus be seen that the new movement grew out of natural conditions and in response to the demands of those who were slowly imbibing the literary ideals of the West. This class of literary public was at first very limited in number. A large majority still adhered to the old ideals, although the observations of Hall just quoted do not seemto take adequate cognisance of this fact. For the sake of a proper understanding of the situation when this movementwas launched, it should be mentioned that the orthodoxsection far outnumbered those in favour of the new ideas, and though during the last fifty years the number of the former has gradually dwindled down, they still form at the present day a very important portion of the Muslim society of India. Hall seems to have always been particularly anxious to keep this class in good humour. Whenever he published any poems or wrote any articles on any literary subject, hewas always full of apology for anything he said which hefelt would not easily commend itself to them. In fact, in the preface to the collection of his poems published in 1892, from which the extract quoted above is taken, he makesthe following rather strange confession of his ignorance of the literary ideals of the West, which, as those who have readhis masterly Prolegomena to his Diwan, which appearedabout the same time, will at once recognise, is a large concession to his orthodox critics. He says : " Neither had I any acquaintance, then (1874), with the principles of Western poetry, nor have I now (1890). Indeed, in my opinion, a satisfactory imitation of Western poetry is not possible in an undeveloped language like Urdu. Nodoubt, to a certain extent, I had by disposition a natural aversion to exaggeration and immoderate language. Toa certain extent this aversion was deepened by the newmovement ; excepting that, there is nothing in my writings which can be cited as an imitation of English poetry or as a revolt against the old style of writing." * 1 See Preface to Majmu'a-i-Nazm-i-ffdli, 1890, Delhi.

We shall revert to this attitude of Hall when we come to discuss the spirit and content of his writings. At this place we shall merely emphasise what we have stated before, that the new movement in Urdu poetry took its rise in Lahorenot a moment too soon, and that Hall, in spite of his modestywas the most important and the best exponent of it. On leaving Lahore, Hall came under the influence of (Sir) Sayyid Ahmad, whose inspiring personality, and the ideals of the Aligarh movement which he led, profoundly affected the mind of Hall, as is borne out by the high tone and purposeof the poems he wrote during the rest of his life, especially of his Flow and Ebb of Islam, 1879, Complaint of India, 1887, The Education of Muslims, 1889, and The Widow's Plaint, 1892.

 (iv) NEW SPIRIT IN OLD FORMS

 What then was the nature of this influence on the mind andart of Hall as manifested in the form of his writings ? As suggested at the beginning of this section, Hall did not feel called upon to borrow any new stanzaic forms fromEnglish poetry. He was rightly of opinion that the Urdulanguage was not sufficiently developed at the time to lend itself either to blank verse or to any of the typical English stanzaic arrangements. Any premature attempts would not only have been attended by failure, but would have brought the new movement into disrepute. He, however, turned his attention to introducing into his poems, as far as the language allowed, two of the chief elements which characterised English writings, viz., unity of idea, which implied an unimpededflow and freedom in expression, and a diction free from convention elements which were absent from Urdu poetry of the preceding centuries. The former was not hitherto possible because of the conditions of rhyme in the mostpopular forms; the latter was not thought of because of the wrong tastes formed by the example of Persian poetry.  The work before Hall was therefore quite clear, difficult though it undoubtedly was of achievement. It was on the one hand to keep rhyme under proper control so as not to let it interfere with the freedom of thought and expression, andon the other to dispense with the conventional diction altogether. It will be remembered that of all the forms in Urdu poetry the Ghazal and Qa$ida devote the greatest amount of attention to rhyme. Hall felt called upon to avoid them. Not that hedid not express himself in these forms in his later years. Hedid, especially in the former. But that was on very rare occasions, and solely with a view to complete his Dlwdn,which was nothing more than satisfying a technical requirement. None of his principal writings, on which his reputation as a poet of the New School rests, is in either of these artificial forms. Hall's studied indifference to Ghazal and Qa$ida against the prevalent taste was a great step forward. It was onebravo attempt to free himself from the restrictions whichhad clogged the freedom of expression and introduced the element of artificiality not only in the works of his predecessors but his own early writings. It led him to search for other forms from the existing list such as in his opinion did not impede the flow of thought and feeling to the sameextent as the Ghazal and Qa$ida did. Of the forms which he largely employed for this purpose, Musaddas and Masnawl deserve special mention. Asdescribed elsewhere, the former is a stanza of six lines consisting of a quatrain followed by a rhymed couplet ; and the latter is the Arabic term for the rhymed couplet, in none of which is the poet required to employ more than two to four words rhyming together. If we exclude blank verse out of consideration, it may without exaggeration be asserted that Musaddas and the Magnawi afford the writer as muchfreedom as any form in English literature.  Musaddaa. His greatest work, The, Flow and Ebb of Islam, is in the Musaddas. It is the longest poem ever attempted in that form in the Urdu language. The greatness of the theme of the poem and the beauty of its diction has popularised the form to such an extent that the work is generally known not so much by its name as by the stanzaic form in which it is written. It is called Musaddas-i-Hali, or the Musaddas of Hall. An important feature of this formis the ease with which it lends itself to the expression of the elegaic or reflective mood. The feeling rises to a climax at the end of the fourth line, subsiding in the last two. Ona smaller scale its structure, representing this rise and fall in feeling, may be said to correspond to that of the sonnet, though the similarity is not on all fours with any one of its two well-known types. The rise is more like the rise in the octave opening the Petrarchan and the fall like that in the rhymed couplet closing the Shakespearean sonnet. The rise and fall are thus not proportionately distributed. The rise in the Musaddas being gradual and within bounds, needed agradual fall as in the Petrarchan sestett, and not so abruptas in the Shakespearean form, where it is apparently justified by the long and sustained character of the rise, which out of sheer exhaustion speedily loses itself in the rhymed couplet. Because of this artistic incompleteness there is not a sense of finality in the mind of the reader at the end of each Musaddas.There is always the feeling that something is to follow, that each fall is calling for and looking forward to a rise. It is like a wave rushing at a steep shore and quickly receding, only to be lost or pushed back again by the next following close behind it. Hall seems to have fully realised the value of such a stanza. It gave him on the one hand adequate freedomfrom the restrictions of rhyme, and on the other, by virtue of its structural peculiarity of letting one stanza anticipate another, a powerful aid and motive power to the develop-  ment and expansion of his theme. The success with whichhe has handled this form in his Flow aad Ebb of Islamis a great landmark in the history of Urdu versification. Since its publication in 1879, every aspirant to the distinction of poet and the number is legion, for, owing to the prevailing tendency, everyone capable of manipulatinga few words rhyming together very usually assumes aTakhallu$, or poetical surname, and feels entitled to write poetry has invariably felt inclined to try his hand at Musaddas. Even a writer like Hafiz Nazir Ahmad, whosegenius was moulded entirely for prose, could not escape the temptation. So large and varied has been the output, during recent years, of so-called poetic literature in Musaddas, in imitation of the stylo of Hall, that it is hardly possible, in a survey such as this, to deal with it at any length. Excepting a very small portion, all of it has already sunk into oblivion. Much of it originally appeared in the flimsy sheets of the Urdu daily newspaper,and has consequently shared the inevitable fate of suchpublications. Of the few poems which have managed to survive so far may be mentioned the Shikwa (Complaint) and Jawdb-i-Shikwa (Reply to Complaint) of Dr, Sir Muhammad Iqbal of Lahore. Masnawi is another important form which Hall chose to employ in order to facilitate freedom of thought andexpression in his poetic utterance. As stated above, it is a distich after the style of the heroic couplet of Pope andDryden. It lends itself to several metrical variations usually ranging from six to ten syllables in each line, andfor that reason possesses a flexibility such as is not possible in the heroic couplet a flexibility which renders Masnawi such a convenient and valuable vehicle of expression of every mood.It is a form which is particularly suited for narrative anddescriptive poetry. Blwa Tel Mundjdt (Widow's Plaint), Hubb-i-Watan (Love of Country), and Edrkha-rut  of Hall, the Sham U Amad awr Eat kl Kayfiyyat (Advent of Evening and the Scene of Night) of MuhammadHusayn Azad, and the Subh-i-Umayd (Dawn of Hope) of Shibli are probably the best of the Masnawls attemptedby the writers of the New School In the polish and sweetness of the language, these new Masnawls may not quite excel the older Masnawls of Badr-i-Mumr and Guhdr-iNaslm, but, in execution of their respective themes, theycertainly are a great advance on them. The subject is always steadily kept in view. The digressions are subordinated to the central interest. Exaggeration, superfluities and meaningless sentimentality and peroration are studiously avoided. The attempt is to say a thing in asimple, clear, straightforward style, and to say it in sucha way as to give the reader a unified effect. Otherforms. Three other forms Rubd'i (quatrain), Maqt'a(Fragment), and the Tarklb-Band (Composite Tie) havealso found favour with the writers of the New School. The Rubd'l is probably the most difficult of compositions. It is usually employed to give expression to some deepconviction or observation on one or other of the problemsof human life. As each Rubd'i is complete in itself, the task of the composer to bring out a great idea in but four lines is by no means easy. It argues on his part the sense of right perspective, a wide experience of men and things anda talent for brevity of expression. The Rubd'i is thus usually the prerogative of a mature mind, and none butthe ablest has been found to handle it successfully. Ofall the poets and poetasters of modern times, only Mir Anis of Lucknow, Hall and Muhammad Akbar Husayn of Allahabad have been able to give us some of the best Rubd'lyydt ever composed in the Urdu language. Maqt'a (Fragment) is another form which calls for restraint and sobriety of expression such as only may be expected of well-cultivated minds. For that reason there are but few  writers who have found it convenient to attempt anything in this form. Hall has written some very good MaqVas,but they are probably not so nearly perfect as some of those attempted by his contemporary, Shibi. In fact the " Fragment " has been the most favourite formwith the latter. His poems entitled An Incident of the Reign of Fdruq (Caliph *Umar), A Supreme Example of Self-Sacrifice, The Heal Cause of the Decadence of Islam, and his Address to the Viceroy (Lord Hardinge of Penshurst), are some of the best specimens which the Urdu languagepossesses of this form of poetry. Tarklb-Band is one more form which has appealed to the writers of the New School. The Complaint of India of Hall is by far the best of the Urdu poems ever written in this form. By employing these several forms and avoiding subjects which require the use of conventional diction, the writers of the New School have to a great extent succeeded in introducing into their poetic writings a measure of that freedom of thought and feeling and expression so characteristic of English literature. The success which has beenachieved so far would not have been possible had the writers attempted to express themselves through absolutely unfamiliar forms. No doubt there were some amateurishattempts to imitate the blank verse and a few of the stanzaic arrangements of English poets attempts which by their obvious strangeness hardly found favour with the general public. 

(v) WHOLLY NEW FORMS FROM ENGLISH

 Some of these may be mentioned here. In the issue of May 1899 of the now defunct Dilgudaz, there appeared a translation of Gray's " Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard/ 5 by Mawlawl Sayyid 'All Haydar Tabdtabdl 9 (nowNawwab Haydar Yar Jang), sometime Professor of Arabic,  Nizam College, Hyderabad, Deccan. The aim of the translator was evidently to effect a literal rendering of the poem in as many lines and stanzas as there were in the original, and observing the same rhyme order throughout, viz. a b a b. A similar attempt was made a month after by one Mr. Sayyid Muhammad Zaniin, who translated the verses entitled " A Ballad " in Goldsmith's Vicar of Wakefield. 'Abdu>l-Halim Sharar, whose work as the leading novelist of the period under review will come up for consideration later on, has given us an incomplete dramatic play in blank verse, dealing with an incident of the time of the downfall of the Arab power in Spain. The play was intended to appear by instalments in the Dilgudaz, of which Sharar was the editor. The first instalment, consisting of the first scene of the opening act, was published in June 1900, with an introductory note by the author to the effect that the subsequent instalments would soon follow if the public extended to him the necessary indulgence. In Septembercame the second instalment of one more scene, with aneditorial note expressing gratification at the encouraging welcome accorded to the previous contribution by someunnamed friends of the author. In the following monthwas given the third scene, but without any commentswhatsoever. And then was heard no more of the play. Why the attempt was given up is all a matter of conjecture. Possibly the enthusiasm of the author's friends was not strong enough to last long, or the author himself realised the futility of his venture. 'Abdu 'l-Halim Sharar is unquestionably one of the mostoutstanding figures in Urdu prose. Success in one department seems to have raised in him hopes of success in everyother. He therefore applied his hand to poetry and versification. Had he employed any of the indigenous forms, he might very likely have been able to know whether his attempts were worth publication. But when he ventured BLANK VERSE

to write a piece of drama in blank verse in imitation of Shakespeare and at the same time hoped, as he expressed in the introductory note, that he might thereby " lay the foundation of blank verse in Urdu language," he seemsto have hardly realised that he was undertaking muchtoo great a task for him. Blank verse is not made byjust drawing a dividing line at the end of each tenth syllable, or at the end of every fourteenth, as he seemsto have done. There is no doubt that Sharar knew this perfectly well. But his production hardly indicates this. In fact, in his natural desire to write in a style different from prose, he has given us something which is neither prose nor verse. A couple of months after Sharar had laid down his pen, Nawwab Haydar Yar Jang TabatabaT, translator of Gray's Elegy, felt inclined to take up the forlorn cause of blankverse, in Urdu. Luckily he did not aim so high as Sharar nor set out to write a piece of drama in the style of Shakespeare. In fact he had no pretensions in that direction. Being, however, a great lover of Urdu, and a great believer in its capacity for expression, he seems to have felt keenly the apparent failure which attended the effort of Sharar, who appears to have once been his pupil, 1 and thereby thought of handling the blank verse himself with a view, no doubt, to show to the public that a successful attemptwas not beyond the bounds of possibility in Urdu language. He did not, as Sharar did, look back into the distant andromantic past of Muslim Spain for a suitable poetic themefor treatment in blank verse. He chose the subject of " blank verse " itself for rendering in blank verse ! As a staunch adherent of the orthodox canons of prosody in Urdu, he could not call blank verse, verse properly so called, for there was no place for rhyme in it. So, while Sharar1 See Sharar's editorial note to TabatabaT 's contribution, Dilgudaz, 1900.  was catholic enough to translate " blank verse " in Urduas Nazm-i-Qhayr-Muqaffa, or " verse without rhyme,"Tabatabai' translated it as Nasr-i-Murajjaz, or "measuredor rhythmic prose," which was a recognised form in Urduwriting. He therefore entitled his contribution " BlankVerse or Measured Prose in the Metre of Quatrain." It is evidently a very interesting title. " Blank verse " maynot seem such an attractive subject for poetic treatment. Still there is no reason why one should not choose it. Moreprosaic subjects have sometimes excited the finest poetic thoughts. There could, therefore, be no quarrel with Tabatabai' on that score. Nor need one grumble at his somewhat pedantic fastidiousness in preferring the expression " measured prose " to " verse without rhyme." It does not make any material difference so long as one understands clearly that both expressions were but genuineattempts to express the same idea connoted by English " blank verse." What, however, is difficult of comprehension in the title of Tabatabai' } s contribution is the principle underlying the suggested liaison between blankverse as understood in English and the quatrain onthe one hand, and Nasr-i-Murajjaz, or rhythmic prose as recognised in Urdu and the metre of Ruba'l or quatrain, on the other. According to English rules of prosody, blank verse needs to be always expressed in iambic pentameter. It may be possible to write unrhymed verse in English in any other metre, but such a verse will not beentitled to the name of " blank verse." To think of writing blank verse in any but iambic pentameter and to divide it into stanzas of four lines each as Tabatabai' has done, is, to say the least of it, not warranted by English example,which he evidently set out to imitate. Division of blankverse into stanzas will defeat the very purpose for whichit has been primarily designed, viz. to give poetic thoughtand feeling the fullest freedom of expression. Nor, do we  think, is there any precedent in Urdu literature, or allowance in Urdu prosody, for cutting out Nasr-i-Murajjaz into lines of ten to fourteen syllables and arbitrarily arranging them in groups of four lines each. It would certainly be a different thing if Tabatabai' had presented his stanza as a new invention altogether, for then we could haveexamined it on its own intrinsic merits; but when he hasattempted to get it accepted under old names and for what it is not, we feel reluctant to observe that he hasset his expectations rather too high. Here is a literal translation of the opening stanza of his Blank Verse or Measured Prose in the Metre of Quatrain. (1) " There are three recognised forms of prose. Of these (2) Measured prose is one ; that is, that expression (3) In which there is poetic metre and in which rhyme(4) Restriction is non-existing ; Idea should be free." 1 Whether such a piece of composition should be entitled to recognition as literature will not be very difficult to decide. To us it seems that an orthodox poet of the standing of Tabatabai', and a purist in style such as he, should never have lent his pen to writing of this description. Another attempt at imitation of English forms deserving of notice is by one Muhammad Azhar 'AH Azad Kakuri,sometime Deputy TahsTldar in the District of Gorakhpur,a writer not much known to the literary public. In the Oriental Section of the Library of the British Museum there is an undated copy of a play by him in rhymed verse entitled, " Jdm-i-Ulfat (Goblet of Affection), or the translation of Shakespeare's well-known drama of A Midsummer Night's Dream" printed at the " Ryazu'l-Akhbar Press," Gorakhpur.The title is misleading, for the play is not a translation but merely an adaptation. What, however, interests us here is his attempt to imitate the metrical language usedby Puck and the fairies in the Shakespeare original. 1 Special translation.  Referring to this in his introduction to the play, the writer has given expression to some interesting observations which may be reproduced here. Says he : " The fairies of Shakespeare are in stature just of the size of a thumb. It would, therefore, be too incongruousto endow them with tongues of the length of a hand.Indeed it is a matter for consideration whether it wouldbe possible for people of such diminutive dimensions to speak in metrical line? each a yard in length. It seemsproper that the lines which emanate from their mouthsshould be as small as their size. The author (Shakespeare) has observed this condition in the original. Unfortunately, however, there is no such short metre in our language. Still, after some consideration, I thought out a device bywhich I could safely follow the example and that wasto employ tiny verses as warranted under the circumstances, in such a manner that every four of them shouldmake a hemistich, and every eight a rhymed couplet so as to fulfil the conditions of Urdu prosody, as follows : Kahln Sahn-i-Chaman, Kahln Bdgh-i-'Adan, Kahln Barg-i-Saman, Kahln Ab-i-Rawan. First hemistich. Kabhl Ldl-i-Yaman, } Kabhl Mushk-i-Khutan, I s cond Kabhi Yih Gulshan, \ *econci Kabhl wah Bustun" } Barring these few spasmodic and apparently inadequateattempts, very little has been done to incorporate into the system of Urdu prosody any new forms from Englishversification. The primary concern of the leading poets has been, as already explained, to get rid of the mostpressing shackles of convention, and introduce elements of simplicity, clearness and naturalness into poetic utterance. The amount of success which has attended their efforts may not be what one would have desired, but it is enoughto dispel every doubt as to further possibilities. It would,1 Special translation. LEADING  no doubt, be invidious to compare an infant poetic literature like modern Urdu, with one so vast in scope and extent and so great in quality as English. But in order to havean idea of the degree of improvement effected in the formand diction of Urdu poetry during the last half-century, it may be stated without exaggeration that the newliterary movement has produced a few poems such as the Flow and Ebb of Islam, Love of Country, Widow's Plaint, Complaint of India, and Invocation to the Prophet, which, in simplicity and naturalness of diction, and depth andflow of thought and feeling and even imagination, maybe worthily placed side by side with any English poemstreating of similar subjects, and expressed in rhymed verse.

(vi) RESULTS ANALYSED

 Before we close this part of our subject it is but fair to acknowledge that the credit for this striking developmentrests essentially with the late Hall. Others, no doubt, there have been, especially the late Akbar of Allahabadand the late Shibli, who have contributed their own share to it. But Hall stands above them all, the leader andinspirer of the movement, who has set the fashion for the rest, whose contribution exceeds in bulk that of anyother, and whose writings represent some of the salient features of English poetry to a degree hardly attained by anyamong his contemporaries or even among the present generation of poets, the best known of whom is Dr. Sir MuhammadIqbal of Lahore. This latter group, mostly the productof modern English education, are the exponents of that sentimental or emotional idealism which has taken its rise among a certain section of the Indian Muslim community,in the wake of the vicissitudes which have overtaken the Turkish Empire during the last fifteen years. We shall in a subsequent chapter speak at some length of their  contribution to poetic thought in Urdu literature. But in this place, concerned as we are with its outward form andtechnique, it should be pointed out that the present-daywriters have not, so far, made any advance on what waseffected by Hall and his contemporaries. In fact, if weaccept the writings of Dr. Iqbal as the best specimen of the literary productions of this latest school of sentimental poetry, we shall not fail to notice a distinct retrogression, a return to the style of the poets whom Hall had deliberately relegated to the limbo of oblivion. This aspect will at once force itself on our attention when we place the Flow andEbb of Islam of Hall, and the Complaint and Reply to the Complaint of Iqbal side by side both treating of the same subject and both written in the same stanza. Inthe one there is simplicity, clearness, grace and beautyof language and diction and a marvellous control over the form and subject. Above all there is an utter disregard of convention. In the other there is no doubt a certain charm of expression suggestive of deep feeling, but noneof the outstanding qualities characterising the Flow andEbb of Islam. Iqbal's Complaint begins in the conventional style, and in the conventional language. The conventional touch is present throughout. Words and phrases andfigures of speech which for centuries have formed the stockin-trade of the composer of the love and ufistic songs are freely employed. There is too much artifice in expression and very little simplicity. It might be urged that the theme of the poem, being so grand, called for a grand style. But a grand style is not synonymous with pomposity. Noris it opposed to clearness. Any poem or any piece of literature which fails to produce an unified effect is defective to that extent. The Complaint is a collection of sentiments such as will excite the vanity or pride of the Indian Muslims, each of which may be pleasing in itself but which together hardly convey any definite or clear idea.  In another place we will discuss these sentiments, suchas they are, in order to appraise the nature of Iqbal's poetic thought in relation to that of other poets. But here wecannot refrain from observing that his art does not by anymeans reach the standard and excellence of that of Hall; and in fact does not show any clear traces of the influence of the forms and technique of English poetry such as the other does. While Urdu prose has been making remarkable progress in almost every direction, Urdu verse remains where it was left by Hall and his contemporaries